BRIDGE Orchestral Works The Collector’s Edition

Sarah Connolly mezzo-soprano Howard Shelley piano Philip Langridge tenor BBC National Chorus of Wales Roderick Williams baritone BBC National Orchestra of Wales Alban Gerhardt cello Richard Hickox Greg BarrettGreg

Richard Hickox (1948 – 2008) Frank Bridge (1879 – 1941)

COMPACT DISC ONE

1 Enter Spring, H 174 (1926 – 27) 18:36 Rhapsody Allegro moderato – Tempo giusto – Andante tranquillo – Tempo I – Energico – Andante molto tranquillo

2 Isabella, H 78 (1907) 18:00 Symphonic Poem after Keats Adagio ma non troppo – Allegretto moderato – L’istesso tempo – Allegro vivo – Adagio ma non troppo – Più adagio

Two Poems for Orchestra, H 118 (1915) 12:58 after Richard Jefferies 3 I Andante moderato e semplice 8:35 4 II Allegro con brio 4:18

premiere recording

5 Mid of the Night, H 30 (1903) 26:05 Symphonic Poem for Orchestra Andante – Allegro moderato – Poco più vivo – Andante moderato – Allegro moderato – Andante moderato – Più lento TT 75:47 3 COMPACT DISC TWO

premiere recording in this version

1 Dance Rhapsody, H 84 (1908) 19:16 for orchestra Allegro energico – Moderato – Allegretto moderato – Tempo di valse – Vivo – Allegro energico

Five Entr’actes, H 95 (1910) 12:05 from the play The Two Hunchbacks by Émile Cammaerts (1878 – 1953) for orchestra 2 I Prelude to Act I. Allegretto moderato – Lento 3:20 3 II Intermezzo from Act II. Andantino 1:36 4 III Intermezzo from Act III. Allegretto (marziale) 1:19 5 IV Prelude to Act III. Lento 2:36 6 V Entr’acte between Acts II and III. Moderato 3:04

7 Dance Poem, H 111 (1913) 13:48 for orchestra Tempo di valse – Lento e languido – Tempo di valse – Largamente – Grazioso – Tempo di valse – A tempo, poco lento – Vivo – Presto

4 8 Norse Legend, H 60 (1905 / 1938) 4:48 for small orchestra Andante con moto

The Sea, H 100 (1910 – 11) 22:08 Suite for Orchestra 9 1 Seascape. Allegro ben moderato 7:14 10 2 Sea-Foam. Allegro vivo 2:23 11 3 Moonlight. Adagio ma non troppo 5:50 12 4 Storm. Allegro energico – Allegro moderato e largamente 6:33 TT 72:34

COMPACT DISC THREE

premiere recording

1 Coronation March, H 97 (1911) 6:49 Tempo di marcia, maestoso – L’istesso tempo ma poco largamente – Allargando – Tempo I

2 Summer, H 116 (1914 – 15) 10:42 Tone Poem for Orchestra Andante ben moderato – A tempo ben moderato e tranquillo – Animato – Tempo I ma poco tranquillo

5 3 Phantasm, H 182 (1931)* 24:21 Rhapsody for Piano and Orchestra Allegro moderato – Allegretto molto moderato – Lento e tranquillo – Allegro moderato – Andante molto moderato – Allegro moderato – A tempo energico e ritmico – Ben marcato – A tempo giusto – Andante – Allegro

4 There Is a Willow Grows aslant a Brook, H 173 (1927) 11:19 Impression for Small Orchestra Adagio e tranquillo – Poco allegretto – A tempo I – Animato appassionato e rubato – Tempo I ma poco più largamente e sostenuto – Lamentoso – Più tranquillo

Vignettes de danse, H 166 (1938) 11:21 for Small Orchestra 5 I Nicolette. Andante moderato – Allegretto moderato – Andante – Allegretto – A tempo poco animato – Moderato – Lento 3:13 6 II Zoraida. Allegretto molto moderato 3:40 7 III Carmelita. Con brio – Grazioso – A tempo con brio 4:19

6 premiere recording in this version

8 Sir Roger de Coverley (A Christmas Dance), H 155 (1922) 4:41 for Large Orchestra Allegro con spirito – Tempo risoluto e più animato TT 69:51

COMPACT DISC FOUR

premiere recording on CD

1 Rebus, H 191 (1940) 10:44 Overture for Orchestra Allegro deciso – Poco moderato – Tempo giusto – Ben ritmico – Tempo I – Moderato – Largamente – Moderato – Poco moderato – Allegro vivo

2 Oration (Concerto elegiaco), H 180 (1929 – 30)† 29:17 for Solo Cello and Orchestra Poco lento – Lento e ritmico – Allegro – Ben moderato (poco lento) – Poco lento – Allegro giusto – Tranquillo – Ben moderato, mesto e tranquillo – Cadenza – Allegro – Lento – Epilogue. Andante tranquillo

3 Allegro moderato, H 192 (1940 – 41) 13:24 Fragment of a symphony for string orchestra Edited by Anthony Pople Allegro moderato – Animato e deciso – Moderato – Poco largamente – Tranquillo – [Animato e deciso] – Allegro deciso – Meno mosso 7 4 Lament, H 117 (1915) 5:19 for String Orchestra Catherine, aged 9, ‘Lusitania’ 1915 Adagio, con molto espressione – Poco più adagio

5 A Prayer, H 140 (1916 – 18)‡ 17:55 for Chorus and Orchestra Andante moderato – Allegro moderato – Poco allargando – Più lento e largamente – A tempo moderato – Poco animato – Tempo I – Tranquillo – A tempo I – Tempo I ma tranquillo TT 77:01

COMPACT DISC FIVE

Suite for Strings, H 93 (1909 – 10) 21:03 1 I Prelude. Moderato – Un pochettino maestoso – Allegro ma non troppo – Tempo I, tranquillo – Meno mosso e tranquillo 7:33 2 II Intermezzo. Allegretto grazioso 3:27 3 III Nocturne. Adagio molto – Un pochettino animato – Tempo I 6:09 4 IV Finale. Allegro vivo – Poco meno mosso – Tempo I 3:45

8 premiere recording

5 The Hag, H 14 (1902)§ 2:25 Song for Baritone and Orchestra Allegro molto

premiere recording Two Songs of Robert Bridges, H 65 (1905 – 06)§ 6:32 for Baritone and Orchestra 6 1 I praise the tender flower, H 65a. Andante moderato – Pochettino più mosso – Tempo I 3:13 7 2 Thou didst delight my eyes, H 65b. Allegro appassionato – Moderato 3:16

Two Intermezzi from ‘Threads’, H 151 (1921 / 1938) 8:33 8 I Andante molto moderato e tranquillo 3:53 9 II Tempo di valse – Animato 4:38

Two Old English Songs, H 119 (1916) 7:30 Arranged for String Orchestra 10 Sally in Our Alley. Andante con moto – Poco tranquillo – Tempo I 4:19 11 Cherry Ripe. Allegretto con moto 3:11

9 Two Entr’actes (1906, 1926) 6:38 12 I Rosemary, H 68b. Andante espressivo e molto rubato – Allegro – Tempo I ma poco più tranquillo 3:54 13 II Canzonetta, H 169. Allegretto molto moderato e rubato – Allegro con moto – Tempo I 2:42

14 Valse Intermezzo à cordes, H 17 (1902) 6:49 No. 2 from Four Pieces for String Orchestra assembled and arranged by Paul Hindmarsh Moderato – Valse lente – Coda

premiere recording

15 Todessehnsucht, H 181 (1932 / 1936) 3:53 Arrangement for string orchestra of Komm, süßer Tod, BWV 478, from Schemelli’s Musicalisches Gesang-Buch, by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 – 1750) Lento e sostenuto – Poco più andante ma sostenuto – Largamente

16 Sir Roger de Coverley (A Christmas Dance), H 155 (1922 / 1939) 4:24 for Strings Allegro con spirito – Tempo risoluto TT 68:17

10 COMPACT DISC SIX

premiere recording

1 Blow out, you bugles, H 132 (1918)# 5:37 for tenor and orchestra Allegro moderato e risoluto – Lento – Andante moderato – Andante ben moderato – Andante moderato – Recit[ando] – Andante ben moderato – Allegro, ma non troppo – Largamente – Maestoso

premiere recording

2 Adoration, H 57 (1905 / 1918)# 2:55 for tenor and orchestra Molto adagio – Adagio ma non troppo – Poco a poco animato – A tempo, largamente

premiere recording

3 Where she lies asleep, H 113 (1914)# 3:01 for tenor and orchestra Andante ben moderato

premiere recording

4 Love went a-riding, H 114 (1914)# 1:40 for tenor and orchestra Allegro

11 premiere recording

5 Thy hand in mine, H 124 (1917 / 1923)# 2:10 for tenor and orchestra Andante moderato

premiere recording

6 Berceuse, H 9 (1901)¶ 5:06 for soprano and orchestra Andante con moto – Poco più mosso – Tempo I

premiere recording

7 Mantle of blue, H 131 (1918 / 1934)¶ 2:47 for high voice and orchestra Andante ben moderato – Tranquillo – A tempo

8 Day after day, H 164i (1922)¶ 4:55 for mezzo-soprano and orchestra Lento ma non troppo – Andante moderato – Poco animato – A tempo moderato – A tempo con moto ma tranquillo – Poco animato – A tempo moderato – Molto sostenuto

9 Speak to me, my love!, H 164ii (1924)¶ 5:56 for mezzo-soprano and orchestra Andante moderato – Poco a poco animato – Tempo I, ma calmato – Allegro con moto – Tempo I, ma tranquillo – Poco a poco con anima – Allegro animato – Moderato – A tempo tranquillo 12 10 Berceuse, H 8 (1901 / 1902 / 1928) 3:23 Andante con moto – Poco più mosso – Tempo I

premiere recording

11 Chant d’espérance, H 18ii (1902) 3:40 No. 2 from Trois Morceaux d’orchestre Allegro moderato – Presto

12 Serenade, H 23 (1903) 2:51 Allegro grazioso – Meno mosso – Più animato – Meno mosso – Tempo I – Presto

premiere recording The Pageant of London, H 98 (1911) 15:08 Suite for wind orchestra 13 I Solemn March ‘Richard III leaving London’. Tempo di marcia ma maestoso 4:41 II First Discoveries 14 1. Introduction. Moderato 2:01 15 2. Pavane. Moderato 1:49 16 3. La Romanesca [a Galliard]. Allegretto 1:04 17 III March ‘Henry VIII entering London’. Allegro marziale 5:33

13 premiere recording

18 A Royal Night of Variety, H 184 (1934) 1:27 Epilogue for orchestra Allegro moderato – Tranquillo – Moderato TT 61:14

Sarah Connolly mezzo-soprano¶ Philip Langridge tenor# Roderick Williams baritone§ Alban Gerhardt cello† Howard Shelley piano* BBC National Chorus of Wales‡ Adrian Partington chorus master BBC National Orchestra of Wales Nicholas Whiting (CD 1) • Janice Graham (CD 2, CD 3) • Lucy Gould (CD 4) James Clark (CD 5) • Lesley Hatfield (CD 6) leaders Richard Hickox

14 Bridge: Complete Orchestral Works

Volume 1 Comes the mid of the night, ends for a while Frank Bridge (1879 – 1941) made his name the brooding, in Edwardian England as a chamber musician Up from the depths of the soul memories well and composer. He was admired for his songs into life. and piano miniatures, and for his tuneful Emblazened [sic] against the night more and chamber music which was described by his more real they are growing; pupil Benjamin Britten as being ‘easy on the Comes the approach of dawn and they die in ear and grateful to play’. Bridge was one of the bleak grey light. the leading viola players of his generation, the No longer under Stanford’s watchful eye, Bridge driving force behind the English String Quartet looked further afield than Brahms and Dvořák for for over fifteen years. However, he was also an his models. He loved the music of Tchaikovsky, orchestral musician of considerable pedigree, for example, and some of this composer’s whose skills as an orchestral player, composer, dark orchestral colouring finds its way into and eventually conductor were championed by the brooding introduction. The music unfolds no less a figure than Sir Henry Wood. with freedom and confidence although within 29 May 1904 marked the first milestone in a sonata-form framework. The balletic first his professional career, when he conducted subject and the lilting, almost Elgarian second the first performance at London’s St James’s episode are both fast and flowing, culminating Hall of a symphonic poem he had finished the in a brilliant fanfare. In place of the development previous October. Mid of the Night, which is there is an extended lyrical episode, begun with receiving only its second performance here, is haunting cor anglais and violin solos and brought an ambitious work of Lisztian proportions; the to an impassioned climax. The recapitulation is twenty-four-year-old Bridge clearly wanted to compressed, driving the music on until it dies demonstrate all that he could do as a composer away with the ‘approach of dawn’. and orchestrator. The score is prefaced with Romantic images of the night, of dreams these lines: and ghostly happenings, re-emerge in his

15 second Symphonic Poem, Isabella, which much Bridge had learned from Tchaikovsky’s he completed in January 1907. Henry Wood Romeo and Juliet. In the final apotheosis tragedy conducted the first performance at a Queen’s gives way to tender resolution as the lovers are Hall Promenade Concert on 3 October 1907. No reunited in death. orchestral work by Bridge follows so detailed Unlike his major chamber works all the a narrative as Isabella. It is based on Keats’s orchestral music by Bridge has a poetic or poetic version of the gruesome Florentine emotional subtext. During the First World War he tale by Boccaccio. Isabella is in love with the retreated from the horrors of the conflict into a handsome Lorenzo. When her two merchant musical landscape of peace, calm, and sunshine. brothers discover this they lure him into a That is not to say that he indulged himself in forest and murder him. In a dream at the ‘dull a rhapsodic Delian idyll; far from it. Rather, he of midnight’ Isabella is visited by Lorenzo’s began to explore a more complex and personal ghost and, taking her nurse with her, she rides harmonic world – gleaned from his experience of into the dark of the forest, digs up her lover’s composers such as Scriabin and Debussy – and body and places its decapitated head in a pot extend his palette of orchestral colour. of basil. Later the brothers steal the ‘horrid In October 1915 Bridge finished a pair of short thing’ and Isabella, heartbroken, ‘dies forlorn, tone poems inspired by the evocative writings imploring for her basil to the last’. Taking the of the ‘nature mystic’ Richard Jefferies. The Lisztian model once again, Bridge’s treatment first is a restrained essay in veiled sonority, is more richly scored and tightly constructed sensuous chromaticism and ambivalent than Mid of the Night. Particularly impressive is tonality. The text comes from Jefferies’s the way in which Bridge unfolds and combines The Open Air: the two themes associated with the lovers – Those thoughts and feelings which are not Lorenzo’s heroic horn call and Isabella’s tender sharply defined, but have a haze of distance oboe melody – into a radiant climax. Their and beauty about them, are always the transformation into a spine-chilling midnight dearest. ride, the moment of the murder of Lorenzo, and The second is an exuberant scherzo, a brilliant his ghostly appearance at Isabella’s bed-side orchestral dance, harmonically well defined. could hardly be more vividly portrayed. The The quotation is from The Story of My Heart: final transformation of Isabella’s theme into a How beautiful a delight to make the world haunting minor-key lament reveals just how joyous! The song should never be silent, the

16 dancer never still, the laugh should sound like Enter Spring is a highly-wrought piece of water which runs for ever. orchestral design, producing a quite distinct Bridge conducted the first performance of his tone colour of its own by an ingenious Two Poems for Orchestra at Henry Wood’s 1917 interweaving of themes in the traditional New Year’s Day Concert in the Queen’s Hall. measure of pastoral compound time. The The 1914 – 18 War precipitated a fundamental traditional pastoral measure, however, is change of direction in Bridge’s career and far from producing that leisurely ruminating music. In a letter to his friend and supporter mood usually associated with it. The music Eduard Speyer, Bridge wrote that the loss of so is swift and strenuous with only occasional many friends and colleagues ‘only makes the episodes in a gentler mood. ache worse’. The decision, at the age of forty, At the height of his creative powers, Bridge to give up professional playing and concentrate found inspiration in the wild and windy spring solely on composing and conducting was to of the Sussex Downs surrounding his country prove problematic. His diary was rarely full at cottage; in fact he had toyed with the idea of first, so he was forced to increase his violin calling the work ‘On Friston Down’. The energy teaching and his production of what he and motivic detail of the fast music contrast described as ‘pot-boilers’, rather than focus his vividly with the grandeur found in the sweeping creative energy on the big orchestral work he phrases of the central ‘pastoral’ melody. This longed to write. The opportunity finally came in melody is contained in an episode which opens 1924, following the great success he scored at with a wonderfully evocative sequence of the 1924 Norfolk and Norwich Triennial Festival ‘birdsong’ over some magical harmonies. At the with his suite The Sea – a performance which end of the work the ‘pastoral’ melody opens out so impressed the young Benjamin Britten. into a resplendent climax, as spring arrives in Bridge was commissioned to write something all its glory. new for the 1927 festival. He completed the © Paul Hindmarsh score of his masterly Rhapsody Enter Spring at the end of May 1927. Ernest Newman, the celebrated critic of The Times, was thoroughly impressed by the work when Bridge conducted Volume 2 it with the Queen’s Hall Orchestra in Norwich on Frank Bridge, like Sir Edward Elgar, was brought 27 October. up in Brighton in the household of a ‘jobbing’

17 musician. The tenth of twelve children, Bridge Mid of the Night, and the following year rose was put to the violin at the age of six by his from the ranks to conduct the New Symphony father, who had given up a printer’s trade Orchestra in some of its early repertoire to teach the violin and to direct the music rehearsals. After that he introduced all but in Brighton’s theatres. There was plenty of three of his own orchestral works to the public. chamber music at home and much lighter Henry Wood and Adrian Boult conducted orchestral fare in the theatre pit on which the others, including his most celebrated young Frank and his cello-playing brother premiere, that of The Sea. But by insisting that William could cut their musical teeth. he conduct his own orchestral performances After his long sojourn as a student at the Bridge undoubtedly restricted the wider Royal College of Music (1896 – 1903), Bridge dissemination of his works. emerged principally as a chamber musician The exuberant Dance Rhapsody is a case in and composer. He had taken up the viola, point. The ink was hardly dry on the score and founded his own quartet – the English String parts when Bridge introduced it to considerable Quartet – with three college friends, and played critical acclaim at the Royal College of Music in two others. In a professional career spanning on 21 July 1908. He also conducted the next more than forty years, Bridge first learned, three performances: on 25 September 1909 then further developed his compositional at the Liverpool Festival of British Music, at a craft through the intimate media of quartets, Queen’s Hall Promenade Concert on 15 October quintets, trios, sonatas, and smaller 1914, and at the Royal Albert Hall on 1 December instrumental works, playing in many of the 1918. Twenty years passed before it was heard early performances himself. Then, from 1923 again – in a BBC broadcast, conducted by until his death in 1941, much of his time was Clarence Raybould. It disappeared once more, spent creating a series of visionary chamber until 1977, and that is much less exposure works for his American patron, Elizabeth than this attractive work deserves. There are Sprague Coolidge. three contrasting dances, linked by short Right from his earliest professional years, transitions and framed by an Allegro energico. however, Bridge harboured the ambition to be a This contains some of Bridge’s most confident conductor and composer for the orchestra. He orchestral gestures, a vigorous compound- made his conducting debut on 20 May 1904 in time pulse, and an heroic horn theme. The first the first performance of his Symphonic Poem of the two waltzes is an Allegretto moderato,

18 an elegant and poised valse noble, with a lilting was given in an English version prepared by main subject introduced by duetting flutes and Cammaerts’s wife, Tita Brand. These five a middle section that sounds as though it has characteristic movements reveal Bridge as come straight out of the ballet Swan Lake by a master of light genre pieces. He based the Tchaikovsky – Bridge was a life-long admirer music on folk-tunes supplied by the author and of the Russian’s heart-on-sleeve romanticism. used a standard theatre orchestra of the time, The second dance is a wistful valse lente requiring double woodwind, a pair of trumpets (Tempo di valse), dominated by the strings and and horns, plus three trombones and a harp. recalling Bridge’s own earlier Valse Intermezzo These last gave him additional tonal resources (1902). At the heart of the work is an echo of the and no doubt helped make his modest opening horn call – recalled if not in tranquillity orchestra sound more ample and colourful. then like a distant memory. The final dance is In order to provide a strong ending for this a fleet-footed quickstep (Vivo), which here has concert suite, I have altered the original order been recorded complete with its bracing middle of the movements. The suite opens with the section for the first time. The cut of this section gentle, lilting Prelude to Act I. The Intermezzo is marked on the score in blue pencil, most from Act II is a hymn-like arrangement of probably by Bridge himself in preparation for innocent simplicity, while the Intermezzo from Clarence Raybould’s broadcast in 1938. Act III, which follows, is a bright fade-in / fade- On 17 November 1910 Bridge conducted the out march that would not be out of place in an first performance of his Five Entr’actes for the operetta by Edward German. In the touching production of the play The Two Hunchbacks Prelude to Act III, a haunting cor anglais solo (Les Deux Bossus) by the Belgian writer Émile reminds us of the Gallic grace that permeates Cammaerts. They formed the second part so much of Bridge’s early music. The Entr’acte of a double bill which began with a staging between Acts II and III is the most robust of the of Handel’s oratorio L’Allegro ed il Penseroso, five pieces, bringing to mind, as nowhere else and was part of an opera season produced at in the music of Bridge, his teacher Stanford and the Savoy Theatre in London by the mezzo- the latter’s highly effective treatment of folk- soprano Marie Brema (the first Angel in tunes, particularly in the Irish Rhapsodies. Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius). Brema was It was with the Suite for Orchestra The Sea, Cammaerts’s mother-in-law. A fairytale play set completed on 5 July 1911, that Bridge scored his in the Belgian Ardennes, The Two Hunchbacks greatest and most lasting success. Henry Wood,

19 who conducted the premiere at a Queen’s Hall satisfying musical argument. We hear clearly Promenade Concert on 25 September 1912, was the surge of the waves in ‘Seascape’. But the a great admirer of the composer and especially first theme, announced on the violas (the of this work. Wood and Bridge conducted it viola was Bridge’s own instrument), is shaped regularly, at the Promenade Concerts and like a wave – rising slowly and then breaking abroad. In the autumn of 1923, for example, into a quick decay. The cries of the seabirds Bridge introduced it to the orchestras and at the end of the movement – falling thirds audiences of Cleveland, Boston, and Detroit. and fourths – are transformed into the playful ‘I enjoyed it tremendously’, he wrote after the splash of ‘Sea-Foam’, and slowed down into the Cleveland performance: more forceful tune on French horns. Slow the Two or three thousand in the audience. Most momentum down still further, add shimmering cordial even at the outset and they were so strings and harp and the same ingredients attentive. Listened like mice… It was exciting. are transformed yet again into the nocturne The happiest thrill I ever get is when the ‘Moonlight’ – the music which so impressed the players are as sympathetic and enthusiastic ten-year-old Benjamin Britten when he heard as the audience. I get something out of that it at the 1924 Norfolk and Norwich Festival. In which is almost impossible to put into words. the finale all the melodies and themes become So what are the ingredients that make subsumed in a vivid ‘Storm’ of rushing seas and The Sea perhaps Bridge’s most successful huge breakers. orchestral work. Well, for one thing, Bridge The Sea was the only orchestral work exploits to the full the colour and texture of for which Bridge supplied his own detailed the orchestra. In fact, all his orchestral music programme: is about something: there are nature-inspired Seascape paints the sea on a summer tone poems, such as The Sea, Enter Spring, and morning. From high drifts is seen a great Summer; there are the war-inspired works such expanse of waters lying in the sunlight. as Oration and the Rebus Overture; and there Warm breezes play over the surface. Sea- are those with a more ambiguous or elusive Foam froths among the low-lying rocks and ‘emotional’ programme, for example Dance Poem pools on the shore, playfully not stormy. or Phantasm. However, in his four-movement Moonlight paints a calm sea at night. The portrait of the sea, imagery, emotion, and first moonbeams are struggling to pierce colour are underpinned by an equally vivid and through dark clouds, which eventually pass

20 over, leaving the sea shimmering in full letting them unfold in the expansive manner of moonlight. Finally, a raging Storm. Wind, rain old. The harmonic language is becoming more and tempestuous seas, with the lulling of elusive and ambiguous, with the whole-tone the storm an allusion to the first number is scale assuming an increasingly important heard and which may be regarded as the sea- role in the tonal structure. Dance Poem is a lover’s dedication to the sea. symphonic waltz in six closely argued sections Bridge composed much of The Sea in corresponding, in outline, to the episodes in Eastbourne, and it is perhaps the unpredictable a traditional sonata form movement: Tempo seas of the English Channel around di valse, ‘The Dancer’ (Introduction); Lento Beachy Head that he had in mind. By sheer e languido – Tempo di valse, ‘Allurement’ coincidence, it was in an Eastbourne hotel (Exposition); Largamente – Grazioso, that Claude Debussy put the finishing touches ‘Abandon’, and Tempo di valse, ‘Tenderness’ to his own symphonic seascape, La Mer. The (Development); A tempo, poco lento, ‘Problem’ two works have little else in common. The (Recapitulation); Vivo – Presto, ‘Disillusion’ Bridge – Debussy connection is more obvious (Coda). The ambitious aim is to convey in in his next orchestral work, Dance Poem, music the emotions expressed in a dancer’s which Bridge composed during the first half movements. There is a basic waltz tempo of 1913. Would he have been inspired to try which fluctuates according to the prevailing his hand at an abstract ballet without the mood. The music’s main ideas – presented in example of Debussy’s Jeux and the prospect ‘The Dancer’ – are deliberately shaped with a of interest from Diaghilev’s Ballets russes – potential for transformation and contrapuntal which, sadly for Bridge, in the end came to association. They become seductive and nothing? Dance Poem was the first work in sensuous in ‘Allurement’ and ‘Tenderness’; they which Bridge took a step away from the tuneful are more robust and forthright in ‘Abandon’, and colourful idiom which had served him so questioning in ‘Problem’; and after a whirlwind well for a decade. He was beginning to ‘spread climax they dissolve into ‘Disillusion’. his wings’. The bold rhetorical gestures and Dance Poem was something of an loose-limbed structures of Dance Rhapsody experiment for Bridge. He knew this, and was give way to a more concise approach. There is not entirely surprised that the work confused an obsessive quality about the way in which audience, critics, and players alike at its first Bridge worries over his themes rather than performance during a Royal Philharmonic

21 Society concert at the Queen’s Hall on 16 March Frank Bridge was a performer first and a 1914. However, it angered him that the work was composer second. In a letter of 1916 to Edward not heard again for almost twenty years. In a Speyer (1839 – 1934), a friend of Brahms’s and letter to Marjorie Fass on 24 July 1933 he wrote: Elgar’s, he mentioned that he spent about three Good or bad, original or unoriginal, likeable or or four months of the year composing. The dislikeable, there it is… I do think it is damned rest of the time he was making a living: playing difficult not to have a cursing fit at the viola in his English String Quartet, playing obtusiveness, apathy and priggishness that violin or viola in Sir Henry Wood’s Queen’s Hall find me doing this work for the second time Orchestra, and teaching violin and coaching in twenty years, when it might – I think – have chamber music at the Royal College of Music, at been in orchestral repertoires long ago. It may various private schools, and at the University be damned again in the October newspapers. of Oxford. Incidentally, it was at Oxford that Actually, it was not and several further he encountered the young Adrian Boult for the performances followed. Bridge conducted first time, and the two were to cross paths Dance Poem for the last time on 1 September again many years later, when Boult was Chief 1939, the night, as he inscribed on the full Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra. score, that Hitler invaded Poland. Bridge’s ultimate ambition was to be known In the 1930s, Bridge was a regular conductor as a composer and conductor, but moving up of BBC studio concerts. He also orchestrated from the ranks proved a tougher proposition a number of his early salon pieces for a new for Bridge than it was for his younger series of light orchestral music, published in contemporary Eugene Goossens, whose rise 1939 by Hawkes and Son. Among these was a from the violin and viola ranks of the London charming miniature tone poem, Norse Legend, String Quartet and the London Symphony originally composed in 1905 for violin and piano Orchestra to the conductor’s podium was and beautifully orchestrated in January 1938. faster and ultimately more successful. According to those old members of the BBC © Paul Hindmarsh Symphony Orchestra, such as Bernard Shore and Sidonie Goossens, who remembered him from the 1930s, he was a very hard taskmaster, Volume 3 skilled and highly musical, but impatient and During the first part of his professional career often brusque. The sketches which his great

22 friend Marjorie Fass made of Bridge ‘in action’ about in his letters. Instead, in 1915 he escaped reveal a conductor of energy and elegance. to the country, musically speaking, producing Henry Wood gave Bridge some of his earliest a trio of orchestral idylls – the Two Poems for opportunities to make a name for himself as Orchestra and the Tone Poem Summer. He an orchestral composer and conductor. Early conducted the first performance of the latter on in 1911, while he was orchestrating The Sea, 13 March 1916 at a Royal Philharmonic Society Bridge tried his hand at some orchestral self- concert in the Queen’s Hall. promotion by entering a Worshipful Company Bridge possessed a fine grasp of naturally of Musicians competition for a Coronation evolving forms – Summer is far from being a March to celebrate the new Georgian era. Delian ramble – and, using a simple ternary Bridge’s score bears the inscription ‘animo ed structure, he fashioned an evocative musical fide’ and the number seventy-nine. In the end picture of a summer’s day in the country. The no prize was awarded, hence his scribble on shimmering string figures which begin the the envelope, returned to Bridge on 1 May 1911, piece are twice interrupted by more ominous ‘Coronation March (damn!!!)’. A large orchestra sonorities before diffusing into a haze of veiled is required and the music is full of impressive harmonies that support the haunting sound of gestures, from the opening fanfare to the the solo oboe. The string figures return – more final climax. However, Bridge’s penchant for playfully this time – while fragments of the tune irregular phrase lengths (in the tunes of both emerge on horns, as if from behind fluffy clouds. march and trio), for modal inflexions, and for Then, as though the summer haze had lifted harmonic excursions to remote keys is not to reveal a glorious sun-drenched scene, we the stuff of popular marches. But what the hear one of Bridge’s most ravishing melodies. It work may lack in patriotic rhetoric, it certainly may sound like the product of pure inspiration, makes up for in lyrical warmth, especially in but the metrical structure of the melody is the sonorous trio section. identical to that which gives the opening pages As Bridge was a pacifist, military tub- of the work their particular baring (12 / 8 x 3; thumping may have gone against the grain. 9 / 8 x 2). The perspective changes when the During the First World War, when some of his principal theme is reprised, and Bridge alters closest friends in the music profession were the aural image yet again in the coda in which killed in action, Bridge was at pains not to dwell the delicate string murmur is transformed into a upon the distressing emotions he felt, and wrote radiant orchestral tutti.

23 Writing home after conducting the American orchestral piece. To be more precise, he premiere in 1923, Bridge noted: excised what he had sketched for the middle …only if there is such a thing as rest in the portion of Enter Spring and transformed it soul of the listener and in the sweetness of a into music as dark and bleak as Summer had summer day away in the heart of the country been light and sunny: the Impression for Small will my piece Summer make any impression. Orchestra There Is a Willow Grows aslant a During the summer of 1922 Bridge was Brook. The title quotes the opening line of struggling over the second movement of his Queen Gertrude’s famous speech in Act IV of groundbreaking Piano Sonata, which was to Hamlet, in which she describes the drowning emerge two years later as his first ‘progressive’ of Ophelia. Bridge’s haunting music follows work. He also wanted to write an orchestral Ophelia’s final grief-stricken moments in clear piece for the Queen’s Hall season in the autumn. musical detail. At the start the undercurrent But there was time only for smaller projects. of shifting, highly chromatic string writing So instead he set to work expanding the reveals the threat of that ‘glassy stream’. The arrangement for string quartet of the traditional forlorn calls on flute, clarinet, and horn – full of tune ‘Sir Roger de Coverley’, which he had characteristic semitones and minor thirds – are completed on 30 June 1922, into a miniature as sad as the cries of Peter Warlock’s Curlew. dance poem for large orchestra. The ink dried Separating the three statements of this ominous just in time for Henry Wood to include the new refrain, the oboe, with harp and strings, takes piece in the programme for the last night of the on the role of Ophelia, singing her plaintive Promenade season, on 21 October. Bridge and ‘old lauds’. These are modal melodies, the first his small band of copyists – actually his wife, slow, the second more animated. Ophelia is Ethel, and their friend Marjorie Fass – completed preparing garlands ‘of crowflowers, nettles, the last part the afternoon before the concert. daisies and long purples for her lost love’. Then, The colourful Sir Roger de Coverley (A Christmas as she clambers up the willow tree to hang Dance), with its free flowing variations and ‘on the pendent boughs her coronet weeds’ (a seasonal inclusion of ‘Auld Lang Syne’, received more urgent version for strings of the oboe’s prolonged applause. tune), she falls ‘in the weeping brook’ (vividly In January 1927 Bridge broke away from portrayed by a clarinet cadenza). We hear her the writing of his most expansive nature chanting ‘snatches of those old lauds’ (oboe and poem, Enter Spring, to work on another short bassoon) until her ‘garments, heavy with their

24 drink, pull’d the poor wretch from her melodious the composer conducting. In a letter to lay, to muddy death’. Mrs Coolidge on 14 January 1934 Bridge Phantasm of 1931 inhabits a spectral world reported: of dreams and ghostly apparitions. It is a piano Last Thursday’s papers were mostly concerto in all but name. The soloist’s part monotonous in their complete disapproval – may not be ‘showy’ in a pianistic way, as it is euphemistic expression – of the concert on in the concerto composed the previous year Wednesday. But I have the greatest pleasure by Bridge’s exact contemporary John Ireland, in saying that Phantasm, with Kathleen Long but the piano is still the first among equals. playing really brilliantly and sympathetically, Bridge was inspired to compose Phantasm plus the BBC Orchestra at the top of its form, after hearing Hindemith’s Concert Music, was one of the very best performances of Op. 49 for piano, two harps, and brass any work with orchestra that ever I had. in November 1930 at Elizabeth Sprague Bridge describes Phantasm as a Rhapsody, Coolidge’s Chicago Festival. Bridge was at not because it is loose or rambling in form the festival for the American premiere of his but because of its unconventional single- Piano Trio (1929). He was impressed with movement plan. It has more in common with the pianist Emma Lübbecke-Job’s playing of the phantasies that Bridge had composed in the solo part and conducted a performance his younger days, and with chamber pieces of the work for the BBC with her as soloist such as the Rhapsody Trio for two violins the following March. As soon as Bridge and viola of 1928, than with any work in the had returned home, he began work on a traditional concerto form. At the outset two concertante work of his own, in the hope related ideas flash by like ghostly apparitions: that Mrs Coolidge – who had supported him they are to provide the thematic basis for the for eight years – would produce it when her whole work. In an extended slow introduction globetrotting festival arrived in Paris in the the soloist ‘improvises’ on them, outlining autumn of 1932. In the event the Coolidge clearer lyrical shapes. The piano then leads Festivals in Europe were confined to chamber the orchestra into the first Allegro episode. music, and Phantasm was consigned to his A ghostly, modal march theme is supported bottom drawer until January 1934, when by a dissonant ostinato. The strange visions Kathleen Long premiered it at the BBC British gradually come into focus. Then the orchestra Music Festival in the Queen’s Hall with begins a macabre, spectral waltz, but as Bridge’s

25 whole-tone chords and tritone-based polychords in this direction as he worries the orchestra a disperse, melodic shapes become more clearly good deal when he does familiar work. defined, tonality grows more stable, and a Consequently there were fewer BBC conducting graceful ‘waltz’ emerges as the second subject. engagements for Bridge, but he was composing The piano soon snuffs it out, however, and leads again with renewed vigour. During 1938 he was the orchestra into a development of the lyrical asked to orchestrate a number of his earlier material of the introduction. The dialogues piano pieces for the new Hawkes Concert Edition between the pianist and various orchestral of light music. The three Vignettes de danse soloists – flute, oboe, violin, and cello – are were intended for this collection, although particularly evocative. Rattling timpani and they never made it into print. Scored for theatre clarinets announce the reprise of the Allegro – orchestra, they originated in a suite of four the first subject march theme – but splitting piano pieces sketched in the autumn of 1925. this reprise in two and inserting the lyrical These were light-hearted musical postcards ‘waltz’ in the gap enables Bridge to work up the from a motoring holiday of the Alps and the ostinato passage into a searing, interrupted, Mediterranean coast with Mrs Coolidge. In the climax. The music quickly dissolves, the orchestrations of three of what Bridge called fleeting images heard at the start disappearing his ‘Marseilles’ vignettes there is plenty of into the gloom whence they had come. ‘local colour’. ‘Nicolette’ is a mildly exotic dance During the early 1930s Bridge regularly featuring oboe at the start; ‘Zoraida’ is much conducted live studio concerts with sections more seductive, with sinuous, modal melodies of the BBC Orchestra, but in 1936 he suffered and dissonant harmonies over a long pedal bass; a serious heart attack, with respiratory while ‘Carmelita’ is the extrovert character, full of complications, from which he never fully Spanish colour, castanets and all. recovered. As is evident from an internal BBC © Paul Hindmarsh memo dated 6 April 1938, Adrian Boult and his senior staff were all too aware of this: I saw Mr. Frank Bridge yesterday… telling him clearly that his programmes had lost their Volume 4 freshness and his conducting likewise… He is Writing in The Sunday Telegraph on 17 November anxious to do a more classical programme, but 1963, Benjamin Britten recalled that a lot of I am not sure that we should let him go too far his pacifist feelings, especially about World

26 War I, came from his first teacher, Frank Bridge, its lyrical beauty, with a compelling directness whose pacifism he described as being typically of expression and simplicity of construction. The gentle. The response of Bridge to the carnage main melody is pentatonic, like a Scottish lament. of the 1914 – 18 War grew out of the loss of so The layers of whole-tone harmony set against many of his close friends and colleagues: the a sustained bass pedal provide the emotional violinist Thomas Morris, for example, who led intensity. For the restatement of the melody Bridge’s English String Quartet, and composers Bridge introduced the most original feature of such as Frederick Kelly, and Earnest Farrar to his string-orchestral technique – a solo string whose memory the tempestuous Piano Sonata trio (violin, viola, and cello) accompanied by the (1921 – 24) is dedicated. Bridge’s pacifism remaining strings. was an emotional rather than an intellectual Sir Henry Wood conducted the first matter, full of complexities and contradictions, performance of the Lament during the 1915 particularly in the 1930s when the threat arose Queen’s Hall Promenade season, in a concert of another war with Germany. of popular Italian music – not perhaps the most In one of his last letters to his American appropriate send-off for this elegiac music, but patron, Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge, dated the piece made a lasting impression on the 18 May 1940, Bridge wrote of his determination audience, as the critic Edwin Evans recalled in that the music he was composing should The Musical Times: not ‘underline or reflect too much upon the The audience was too spell-bound for a distressing emotions with which everyone is noisy demonstration of favour, but the assailed’. Bridge held a similar view during the eloquence of the music had achieved what 1914 – 18 conflict, when he retreated, musically a more ambitious or studied composition speaking, into a rural idyll with works like could not have affected. Summer and the Two Poems for Orchestra. In the spring of 1916 Bridge drafted a more However, one brief and typically personal extended, though equally poignant, war work. war work was performed during those years. This was his plea for peace, a setting of ‘A Prayer Bridge composed a Lament for string orchestra that the Will of God Be Done’ from The Imitation on 14 June 1915 in memory of Catherine, a young of Christ by the fourteenth-century German friend, who with her family was drowned when mystic Thomas à Kempis. A Prayer was the the Lusitania was sunk. It is one of his most only work by Bridge for chorus and orchestra. effective miniatures, poignant yet restrained in He cast it in a simple verse form, with choral

27 writing clearly tailored for the massed ranks All his convictions and emotions about the of amateur choral societies. He does not First World War were enshrined in this cello extend the voices beyond chordal textures concerto, which he completed on 29 June and imitative counterpoints that his teacher 1930, nearly twelve years after the Armistice. Stanford would have approved of. So one might According to Florence Hooton, the cellist in say that the piece lacks ambition, but it is the first performance (17 January 1936), Bridge sensitive to the meditative nature of the text changed the title from Concerto elegiaco to and to the mood of the times. Harmonically Oration because he wanted to make clear that it is one of Bridge’s most straightforward the work was an outcry against the futility of middle period works. This makes the climax, war. Memories of personal loss and of a way the moment of the greatest dissonance at of life wiped out had not diminished since the the words ‘love to be despised and not to be years of the Piano Sonata. However, with the known in this world’, all the more effective. passing of time and the radical transformation Without any prospect of a performance of his musical language Bridge was now ready to during the war years, Bridge did not complete convey the depths of his feelings with music of the orchestration of A Prayer until October 1918. appropriate richness and power. By this time the end of the hostilities was in As soon as the work was completed he wrote sight. Publication, then a first performance, to Mrs Coolidge, hoping that she would be able to followed closely upon the signing of the stage the premiere in Chicago with his old friend Armistice. Bridge conducted the first Felix Salmond as the soloist. That event did not performance himself in the vast spaces of materialise, and left to his own devices at home the Royal Albert Hall in January 1919, and then Bridge experienced great difficulty in persuading again in 1935. By that time he had composed an orchestra to promote a performance, or all the radical works upon which his reputation another cellist to learn the demanding solo part. as one of the most adventurous of twentieth- Eventually the BBC agreed to a broadcast, but century English composers rests, works problems with soloists delayed matters further. such as the Third String Quartet, H 175 (1926), In the end Bridge found an interested soloist the Piano Trio No. 2, H 178 (1929), the piano in Florence Hooton, a young cellist not long concerto Phantasm (1931), and what is perhaps out of College, who two years previously had his greatest orchestral work, certainly his impressed him with her performance of the cello most personal, Oration. part of the Second Piano Trio.

28 For the first time since Felix Salmond’s that follows as ‘like a funeral march’. The premiere of the Cello Sonata in 1917, all the cellist’s response to this vivid orchestral press notices were favourable. One of the evocation is two-fold: first an impassioned most considered came from Ernest Newman outburst, angular in contour and full of anger (The Sunday Times, 19 January 1936): in expression, the anger then giving way to Frank Bridge’s new concerto… is not the kind grief – a simple but haunting lyrical episode. At of work we can expect to grasp in anything the heart of the work is a second march, this like its totality at first hearing; it may even time a grotesque parody of a funeral cortège. be that, lacking an inside knowledge of the One might imagine here the relentless advance ‘mental images’, we shall never be able to of wave upon wave of young soldiers, ordered see it exactly as the composer saw it, for its out of the trenches on the battlefield only to abrupt, sometimes spasmodic changes of be mown down by enemy guns. A version of mood cannot be accounted for on the lines of ‘The Last Post’ – with the main fanfare interval so-called ‘pure music’. distorted from a perfect fifth to a tritone – But even at a first hearing it is evident that sounds at the climax. the work comes from a fine mind, that its Bridge then reviews the material of the first departures from the current obvious are not half of the work, but after the searing return mere pose or eccentricity, but the natural of the parody march the music is reprised in a expression of a personal way of thinking. different order and works towards a resolution. The musical landscape of Oration is haunted A few bars of the lyrical lament give way to by ‘mental images’ of the War. Bridge cast the Cadenza. Then, in a moment of sheer the concerto in a broad single movement, genius, Bridge the master merges the angular adopting a variant of the ‘phantasy’ form which impassioned music with a further reprise of he had exploited with conspicuous success the lyrical lament: his vision has embraced the in his youthful Cobbett prize ‘Phantasies’ horror, the futility, and the grief or war. After a and then made very much his own in some final reappearance of the funeral march Bridge of his later chamber works. The soloist (the offers a brief, slow Epilogue: a kind of pavan orator) establishes the thematic content and in which the angular succession of chromatic the elegiac mood in the opening orchestrally intervals becomes modal, the bleak harmonic accompanied recitative. In his short score language – centred on C and E – finding sketch Bridge describes the slow processional resolution in the peace of D major. Perhaps this

29 is Bridge’s evocation of, or expression of hope for, In the event, the blitz caused the curtailment of a world without the horrors of war. the 1940 Promenade season, including the Rebus However, any hope for peace that Bridge may premiere. Bridge did not live long enough to have articulated in the closing pages of Oration hear the work. Sir Henry Wood was instrumental was soon dispelled as Europe moved inexorably in arranging the first performance, given ‘In towards a second conflict. For some time before Memoriam’ on 23 February 1941 at one of the outbreak of the 1939 – 45 War Bridge had been Sir Thomas Beecham’s Sunday Concerts, just contemplating the composition of an overture three days before what would have been entitled Rumour, but by the time his thoughts Bridge’s sixty-second birthday. began to take more definite musical shape, According to its dictionary definition, a the fighting was well established and the word rebus is a sort of graphic riddle, an enigmatic ‘rumour’ had taken on sinister implications. As representation of words, or their sound, by Bridge wrote to Elizabeth Coolidge on 18 May 1940, pictures. The decision to use Rebus in place I have been toying with the idea of an of Rumour may therefore have increased the orchestral work entitled Rumour, but as it is mystery surrounding the work’s ‘meaning’, but nowadays associated with treachery and according to Edwin Evans it did not change brutality – amongst other loathsome and Bridge’s expressive aim. It merely removed any horrifying things – that intention has gone direct association with the war. The way Bridge overboard. manipulated his themes would support Evans’s So Bridge renamed the work Rebus. In his last contention. Rebus, it seems, was indeed meant letter to Benjamin Britten, who was by then in to convey, in musical terms, how ideas, thoughts, the United States, he explained some of the images can become progressively distorted background for his newly completed score: and their meaning transformed from innocent Only by dint of some hard work, I just finished to macabre. There are two themes in Rebus: a a Concert Overture for the next Proms ‘simple’, light-hearted main subject laid out in (September 28). That was August 2nd, and I octaves at the outset, and a broad, sweeping shall write you a ream or two in due course. second subject in C major. The idiom is extrovert It hath the awe-inspiring title of Rebus. As and direct, in contrast to the uncompromising usual, the next work of my working is, in the style of his music from the 1920s and ’30s. end, ever something different to what it might Late in 1940 Bridge told the family friend have been… Marjorie Fass that he felt he was composing his

30 most significant work. In the early 1920s it had Friston Field, 23.1.41 been his greatest wish to receive a commission Benji darling, for a symphony, an ambition that was never What a sad, sad grief our telegram must have fulfilled. In the event, chamber music dominated been to you. I am so deeply sorry for what you his thoughts in the 1920s, and he had little have lost in our lovely old Franco, with all his appetite for composing at all in the mid-1930s sweetness, his greatness and his gentleness. when he struggled to get his new concertos Thank heaven he was spared suffering – for his performed. However, in 1937, after recovering heart just stopped in his sleep. He had been from serious illness, he began to compose again. out in the snow and bitter wind for a day or so This ‘Indian summer’ bore fruit in works that and must have caught a chill on his tummy… turned in new and more optimistic directions. By the time… [the] doctor came it was too The clean, almost classical orientation of style late… His arteries were hardened and his heart perceptible in Rebus was further explored in a too weak to stand the vomiting… Lovely that symphony. Adopting his favourite instrumental during this war he could turn his mind with forces, the string ensemble, as medium, Bridge his beautiful world of sound, and write the worked on this symphony right up to his sudden Overture Rebus… and he was making a fair copy death on 10 January 1941, leaving a fragment of a string symphony he liked very much – and headed Allegro moderato that offers a powerful told Eth. that we should like. Alas the score isn’t foretaste of what might have been. finished – and how we long for our Benji to look He sketched 379 bars of music which evolves over the sketches and see what he meant to slowly, but after a powerful climax dies away do. Perhaps you will some day… quickly, ending on the same chord with which In fact, Britten never did and the last twenty-one it began. The movement is structured in an bars of the fragment were orchestrated by elaborate sonata form, but as it does not have Dr Anthony Pople in the 1970s. the internal range or contrast that his single- © Paul Hindmarsh movement ‘Phantasies’ possess, this Allegro moderato is likely to be the first movement of an intended multi-movement work rather than a self-contained symphony in one movement. Volume 5 Marjorie Fass recalled the events of Bridge’s In the 1930s, after the death of his parents, last day in a letter to Benjamin Britten: Benjamin Britten became more than just a

31 past pupil of Frank Bridge. As the many letters Britten described as ‘all that hideous, if worthy from Bridge to his ‘Benji’ reveal, the older man striving!’ had assumed the role of mentor and guide. At home in Brighton there had been plenty Elsewhere in his correspondence Bridge even of light orchestral fayre for young Frank and his refers to Britten as his ‘quasi adopted son’. It is cello playing brother William to experience in little wonder that Britten in turn became Bridge’s their father’s theatre orchestras. The best of staunchest champion and advocate. his orchestral miniatures from this early period Writing in 1947, six years after Bridge’s death, are confident and technically accomplished. Britten set out some persuasive reasons why the The Valse Intermezzo à cordes (note the so-called salon music of Bridge – the easy-going French title) is a prime example. Completed lighter work of his early years – should be taken in Eastbourne on 22 August 1902, this waltz as seriously as the masterworks of his maturity. for strings is the most elegant of all Bridge’s ‘Bridge was’, he observed, student works. The main waltz section is not only a listener and composer, but a player slow and in Bridge’s favourite key for strings, too… He wanted to write or to play music E minor (the same key as Elgar’s youthful grateful and easy to listen to, which some Serenade and Bridge’s own Suite for Strings). people label and dismiss as salon music… His The melodies have a French accent, with the inclination was instinctively towards the French occasional Russian inflexion. The trio section tradition of skill, grace and good workmanship is faster, the melodies, beginning on the cellos, and away from nineteenth century German are more expansive. The Coda builds to a decadence. whirlwind climax and ends abruptly in a flurry Like his exact contemporary John Ireland, of high harmonics. The Valse Intermezzo was Bridge was never so slavish a follower of his not published or performed until 100 years teacher Stanford, and his Brahmsian ways, as after its composition. It is now available as some commentators have observed. Even in the second of four early pieces, assembled his most ambitious student works, such as and arranged for string orchestra from the recently revived String Quintet in E minor different manuscript sources; those of the (1901), it is the freshness of invention of Dvořák, other three are a short piano score sketch the emotional energy of Tchaikovsky, and the also in the string key of E minor (Moderato, elegance of the French tradition that seem to H 29), a nostalgic violin and piano miniature have attracted Bridge rather more than what (Con moto, H 22), and a humorous Scherzo

32 Phantastick (H 6) for string quartet, also in 1905 and orchestrated in the following January. E minor. These, too, were first heard in a Patron’s Fund Bridge never approached writing for the Concert, the twelfth, given this time in the voice with the same adventurous spirit or Queen’s Hall, London. Robert Chignall was the ‘inside knowledge’ as he did writing for strings. baritone soloist and Bridge conducted the Two thirds of his fifty-eight songs with piano newly formed London Symphony Orchestra. were composed in his twenties and early All three songs here receive their first thirties and he stopped composing songs performance for almost a century. Bridge altogether in 1925. However, there are some composed two other orchestral songs in his exquisite examples, especially among the slow twenties, settings of Laurence Binyon, which songs, and there are several unexplored gems, are extant in complete short score. for example the early orchestral songs. The Hag, The Suite for Strings in E minor possesses a rumbustious setting of Robert Herrick’s poem, all those ingredients that Benjamin Britten so was one of the first of his own orchestral works admired in early Bridge: Gallic grace, technical that Bridge ever heard and it was certainly the sophistication, a style grateful to listen to first he ever conducted in public. Completed and to play. Bridge composed it over the on 18 June 1902, this vivid witch’s ride was Christmas period in 1909. Although he never one of the highlights of the very first Patron’s considered himself to be part of an English Fund Concert, given in the Royal College of school of composers – he disliked being Music on 9 December 1902, when it was sung pigeonholed – he often wrote themes based by the baritone Albert Garcia. The series had on the modes so beloved of the quintessential been established to give promising students English composers of the twentieth century: from the Royal College of Music and the Royal Vaughan Williams, Holst, and Herbert Howells. Academy of Music in London a platform for The opening of the ‘Prelude’ is the clearest their work. Bridge’s brief but energetic song example. A lilting modal melody frames three was heard alongside works by York Bowen and extended lyrical paragraphs, which build in Gustav Holst, among others. intensity and incident towards a passionate The Two Songs of Robert Bridges – the climax. There is a grace and charm about the flowing setting of ‘I praise the tender flower’ ‘Intermezzo’, whose main theme is a ‘country and the more animated treatment of ‘Thou didst cousin’ of the opening modal melody – deftly delight my eyes’ – were composed in October disguised. With the haunting ‘Nocturne’ Bridge

33 enters deeper emotional territory. The harmonic Threads. It ran for twenty-eight performances language is much more ambiguous. In what between 23 August and 17 September 1921, key is the opening phrase, for example? It then sank without trace. Even at the time, is worth remembering that Bridge’s English it was the music that stole the headlines. String Quartet in 1903 was the first to play Bridge found it ironic that a minor, if engaging Debussy’s String Quartet in Britain, and the work such as this should command more slow movement of that quartet is perhaps attention in four weeks than many of his major an influence here. The ‘Finale’ is an extrovert pieces did in a lifetime. Nothing of this music romp, bristling with life and on two occasions was published until 1939 when, along with given an Elgarian weight. Ever conscious of a number of his shorter piano miniatures, the niceties of overall balance and proportion, Two Intermezzi from ‘Threads’ appeared Bridge weaves references to the ‘Prelude’ and in versions for theatre orchestra. The first, ‘Intermezzo’ into the movement’s development. a gentle Andante, is another of his wistful, The Suite for Strings was not an instant ‘English’ melodies, with falling phrases full of success. In fact, it was not published until nostalgic regret. The second, Tempo di valse, after the First World War and received its first is one of the most high-spirited of Bridge’s significant performance on 8 October 1920, many dance movements – a pastiche Viennese when the composer conducted the work at a waltz, with an energy and orchestral colour Henry Wood Promenade Concert in the Queen’s that look forward to the exuberant Rhapsody Hall. Enter Spring. Also published in 1939 were two By then his musical style had moved on a more recycled miniatures, beautifully scored good deal. Bridge had begun, as he often wrote for theatre orchestra and given the title Two to friends, ‘to spread my wings’. However, the Entr’actes. ‘Rosemary’ is the charming and early 1920s were frustrating years for him. The popular second Sketch for piano from 1906, and music he was longing to write demanded more the little ‘Canzonetta’, originally called ‘Happy time than he was able to devote to it. There South’, was composed in 1926 after a pleasant was opportunity only for smaller projects. In holiday to the French Mediterranean. July 1921 he composed his second incidental In 1932 Bridge was invited by the Music score, this time ‘for Denys Grayson and the Department of Oxford University Press to St James’s Theatre’ in London. The play was contribute to an album of Bach transcriptions. a three-act comedy by Frank Stayton called This album had been the idea of the pianist

34 Harriet Cohen, who was a notable Bach composition. This is not arranged music. Just interpreter. She gave the first complete like Benjamin Britten a generation later, Bridge performance of A Bach Book for Harriet Cohen adopted the tunes as if they were his own. on 17 October 1932 in the Queen’s Hall, London. In the Two Old English Songs of 1916 he set Bridge chose to set the funeral chorale Komm, familiar melodies in a sophisticated manner süßer Tod (Come, sweet death), entitling his about as far removed from that of Vaughan piece Todessehnsucht. Some of the other Williams and Holst as could be imagined. ‘Sally composers produced elaborate contrapuntal in Our Alley’ is elaborated and embellished, transcriptions, most notably Vaughan with sophisticated, highly perfumed Williams, Herbert Howells, and Arnold Bax. harmonies. ‘Cherry Ripe’ is a miniature Bridge, on the other hand, offered a simple technical tour-de-force. The bustling opening and stylish three-verse structure in which gives no hint of the tune, and this eventually the piano imitates the harpsichord. In 1936 he eases in unannounced, emerging out of the produced the richly textured version for large contrapuntal texture as the second subject. string orchestra, with multiple divisions for There is a touch of class in the way Bridge all but the double-basses, recorded here. The towards the end combines his own energetic sound is as luxuriant as in any transcription subject with the more sustained phrases of by Leopold Stokowski. Bridge specifies a the traditional melody. Even more elaborate string orchestra of twenty-four violins, twelve is his treatment of the old English dance tune violas, twelve cellos, and a minimum of four ‘Sir Roger de Coverley’ of 1922. This, too, was double-basses. In the edition used here the originally a piece for string quartet. Bridge parts have been slightly redistributed so as to re-composed it for large orchestra later make the arrangement performable by a more the same year, but the present version for conventional string band. string orchestra from 1939 is the most When interviewed by Musical America during familiar. Sir Roger de Coverley is a diminutive his three-month visit to the United States in dance poem in two episodes. The first unfolds 1923, Bridge made it absolutely clear that he in a series of free variations; the second was an English composer by virtue of his birth might almost be described as a ‘knees up’, rather than by nationalist musical ideology. All in which Bridge gradually cranks up the the traditional tunes he set for strings (quartet energy and textural complexity. The or orchestra) became a part of the fabric of the appearance of the Scottish tune ‘Auld Lang

35 Syne’ gives this ‘Christmas Dance’ its seasonal them were composed early in his career, connotation. during or just after his years under the eagle eye of Stanford at the Royal College of Music © Paul Hindmarsh in London. They are often rather conventional in tone, relying heavily on the expectations of his teacher, or on the styles which were Volume 6 commercially successful at the time – in the Throughout his career, Frank Bridge considered songs of Roger Quilter and Maude Valerie himself to be very much a ‘working’ composer, White, for example. There is more than a hint and he developed a musical technique which of the Victorian or Edwardian salon in songs few of his contemporaries could rival. He was such as Go not, happy day or E’en as a lovely never as confident using words, although the flower. What cannot be denied, however, is the fluency and sheer volume of his correspondence technical skill they reveal. What they might lack might contradict that judgement. This is how he in personal melodic invention or expression assessed his own abilities in a letter to his patron they make up for in the structure and overall Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge in September 1922: tone. They always work. If there were ever a human being less equipped Among the most effective are the handful with the art of expression in words, then he of songs Bridge conceived for voice and must indeed have been completely hopeless. orchestra. There are two unorchestrated Everything I put down reads at least one- sketches for low voice of texts by Laurence hundred per cent cooler than I intend it. At Binyon – Lament and Fly home, my thoughts – last, after a long apprenticeship, I think I know which anticipate some of his later harmonic just when and how to put a few cellos and adventures. However, the most engaging of violas and woodwind together, and even add all the early orchestral songs is in fact one trombones at the right moment – but in words! of Bridge’s very first surviving compositions. No, they stump me. After this confession of Dorothy Wordsworth’s poem ‘The days are weakness I am sure you’ll know exactly where cold, the nights are long’ is a gentle, rather you have to transpose everything up at least an sentimental nocturnal lyric. Bridge often octave and a half. returned to images of the night – dreams, In his sixty songs, too, Bridge rarely turned nightmares, the silence and isolation of up the thermostat to full. More than half of darkness – but in this Berceuse the night scene

36 sets the mood for a song of innocence. Bridge expanded stylistic horizons. In the gently lilting responds with an engaging freshness. The Where she lies asleep, a setting of words by song is beautifully scored and the inclusion Mary Coleridge, composed in April 1914, the vocal of a cor anglais and four horns within what line is freer than before, rhythmically following is otherwise a small orchestra adds a darker the rise and fall of the text rather than being tone – almost Wagnerian in this context – to the cast in a fixed metre. Bridge is also entering new central climax. expressive territory here. In Adoration the mood Bridge took a great deal of trouble over moves from quiet contemplation to an ecstatic his 1905 setting of Keats’s Asleep, which he outpouring of love. In Where she lies asleep entitled Adoration. It exists in a number of the love appears all the more intense because versions, the final one dating from 1918, just it is left unspoken. The latter’s companion, the prior to the song’s publication. The impressive energetic Love went a-riding, completed on thing about the setting is the way in which the 5 May 1914, is the composer’s most famous cantabile grows in a single rising span from the song, although in later life Bridge dismissed it low, almost supplicant ‘O sleep a little while, as simply one of his pot-boilers. In its original white pearl!’ to blossom in the final realisation, version it has one of his most extrovert piano at the top of the voice: ‘Vows of my slavery, my accompaniments, which he transforms, with giving up, / My sudden adoration, my great love!’ unerring skill, into a miniature orchestral The sumptuous orchestration for symphony showpiece. Love, riding full tilt on the back of orchestra with triple woodwind and full brass Pegasus, is only a fleeting guest despite the is probably contemporaneous with the final, pleas of ‘all the youths and the maidens’. published version. Thy hand in mine, completed on 10 February In his book Sensibility and English Song, 1917, is the third and last of the Mary Coleridge Stephen Banfield refers to a change of tone settings and offers the resolution, an affirmation that became apparent in Bridge’s songs around of enduring love in simpler, unambiguous terms. the outbreak of the First World War – a greater The rather restless rocking figure of the first assurance, indicating perhaps a more personal song and the tempestuous galloping of the expressive imperative. Of course, this was also second have now become steadier, like the a time when Bridge was beginning to extend beating of two hearts almost in unison. his musical techniques, so the new-found In March 1918 Bridge wrote another range in his songs may be a direct result of his nocturnal song, Mantle of blue, setting a gentle

37 lyric by the Irish poet Padraic Colum. On the is the identical chord (though on a different face of it the poem is a simple lullaby, but in a root) with which Bridge was to begin his cello radio interview Colum hinted at some deeper concerto, Oration, more than a decade later. meanings. Could the child perhaps be dying? In With the benefit of hindsight, and despite the his setting Bridge seems to have recognised an undoubted quality of this song, one wonders underlying unease, which he suggests through whether he was entirely at one with the idea the ambiguity of major and minor tonalities and of the noble sacrifice that is at the heart of the unsettling whole-tone accompaniment Brooke’s poem. in the middle section. Blow out, you bugles Bridge’s finest songs date from the is a setting of Rupert Brooke’s most famous 1920s, in particular three settings of poems war poem. Bridge completed it in May 1918 at by Rabindranath Tagore in the poet’s own the invitation of the wife of the tenor Gervase translations from the Hindi – Day after day Elwes. Bridge dedicated the song to them (January 1922), Speak to me, my love! (October both, Elwes giving the first performance on 1924) and Dweller in my deathless dreams (June 26 October 1918 at the Queen’s Hall in London, 1925). The first two were composed as a pair with the composer conducting. In scale Blow for mezzo-soprano and orchestra. The third out, you bugles is more akin to a solo cantata was written with piano accompaniment for the than a song. The orchestral introduction sets tenor John McCormack. These belong to a very a noble tone. Where Brooke meditates on different expressive world – one of alienation, the sacrifice of so many young lives, Bridge or of thoughts and emotions implied rather responds with some poignant declamation – than stated. The vocal line is declamatory, the a style he would develop further in his one-act musical language and orchestration are more opera The Christmas Rose (1919 – 29). Two more exotically perfumed, with whole tones and features point to later stylistic developments. complex higher dominant harmonies. Bridge On the word ‘Pain’, for example, Bridge had learned much, it seems, from Debussy, introduces a chord comprising overlapping Ravel, and Scriabin. At the end of the second dominant seventh formations, one on F, song, as the two souls finally drift apart and go the bass, and the other a tritone away on their own ways, the despairing urgency of the B (C flat). Towards the centre of the song, cry ‘Speak to me, my love!’ is followed by one of when the trumpet sounds the Last Post, the the most poignant of musical evocations of the supporting harmony, with its displaced bass, loneliness of separation. As Stephen Banfield

38 so tellingly puts it, ‘The eloquence denied to Frank Tapp, and Haydn Wood, all employed speech is supplied by the music’. saxophones, Bridge chose not to use them. There are only two works in the whole Frank The suite The Pageant of London that receives Bridge canon that involve wind instruments its premiere recording here is based on a alone: the four Divertimenti for wind quartet new edition which preserves Bridge’s original completed in 1938 and the music composed music intact, but also provides for cuts and for The Pageant of London almost thirty years optional instruments when, as here, larger earlier. In 1906 the historian Richard Davey forces are not available. The movements for the published a history of England, AD 40 – 1900, Pageant of London were the only works Bridge entitled The Pageant of London. Five years composed for military band. Late in 1927 he later The Pageant of London was staged in refused a commission from the BBC to write a celebration of the coronation of George V. A short symphonic poem or overture for the BBC monumental historical spectacle, it presented Wireless Military Band. That honour eventually a series of twenty-eight tableaux which took went to Gustav Holst, who replied with his four days to unfold. It was estimated that masterpiece Hammersmith. more than three million people went to Crystal The suite begins with a ‘Solemn March’ from Palace during the run of performances in May the first of the two scenes. It is resplendently 1911 to see it. Bridge provided music for two of scored, full of Elgarian pomp and circumstance, the tableaux, which he numbered Scenes 4 and depicts the departure for Bosworth Field and 5, but which a commentary in The Musical of Richard III from London. The suite ends with Times of the day reported as being Scenes 3 another ‘March’ from the same scene, one that and 4. The performing forces used matched was used to illustrate the return to London the epic nature of the enterprise and included of King Henry VIII. The main section of this massed choirs and a huge military band. Bridge’s march is a transcription, down a tone, of an manuscript score specifies an instrumentation organ piece originally composed in 1905 and that includes no fewer than eighteen clarinets, published in the First Book of Organ Pieces. For six cornets, six horns, two tenor tubas, four the trio, Bridge offered a spectacular collage bass tubas and two double-basses. A full based, appropriately but perhaps not with complement of saxophones was available, and historical authenticity, on the Westminster although the other contributing composers, chimes. Between these marches comes ‘First who included Vaughan Williams, Holst, McEwen, Discoveries’, a sequence of three dances

39 scored for smaller forces. The ‘Introduction’ After he had finished his Violin Sonata in is a pastiche minuet. The ‘Pavane’ and 1932, Bridge seemed to loose his enthusiasm ‘La Romanesca’ are adaptations from for composition. His new works were by and Renaissance sources. The ‘Pavane’ is an large not well received and he hit something arrangement of ‘Belle qui tiers ma vie’ from of a fallow period. However, he summoned his Arbeau’s Orchésographie (1588) and predates creative energies briefly on 4 May 1934 to write by fifteen years the famous version by Peter a tiny Epilogue for orchestra, which was played Warlock in his Capriol Suite. live on BBC radio, following a Royal Night of In his early twenties Bridge composed a Varieties, four days later. Bridge cast A Royal number of genre pieces for various instrumental Night of Variety, as he named the piece, rather forces. The Berceuse which begins the trio of like a fanfare in reverse, gradually winding Edwardian miniatures included on this disc is one down from the spirited opening to end on a of his earliest surviving compositions. An original, gentle added-sixth chord. For the broadcast somewhat gauche orchestral version remains there was a spoken element, placed in the unpublished. The version recorded here is an pauses which Bridge had crafted into the orchestration made in 1928 of the simplified score. version which Bridge had produced for violin © Paul Hindmarsh and piano in 1902. The Chant d’espérance is one of three Morceaux d’orchestre also composed during 1902. These are three songs Born in County Durham, the mezzo-soprano without words – a song of sadness, this Sarah Connolly studied piano and singing at song of hope, and a song of joy. They have the Royal College of Music and has performed never been published and of the three, this in concert at the Salzburg Festival, Vienna charming number is by far the most successful. Konzerthaus, Berlin Philharmonie, Amsterdam During his student years Bridge improved his Concertgebouw, and Sydney Opera House with technique work by work, and by 1903 he had such conductors as Sir Simon Rattle, Sir Colin developed quite a sophisticated approach to Davis, Edo de Waart, and Philippe Herreweghe. the period miniature, as is amply evident in the A regular guest at the BBC Proms, she also took deft way with which he handles the rhythmic part in the festival for the opening of the new syncopations in his Serenade (April 1903), Zankel Hall at Carnegie Hall in New York. She originally written for violin or cello and piano. has sung the title roles in Ariodante and Serse

40 (New York City Opera) and in The Rape of Osud, Dyson’s Quo Vadis, Tippett’s King Priam, Lucretia (Munich Festival), besides Ino and and Britten’s War Requiem (Gramophone Juno in Semele (San Francisco Opera), Sesto Award), Peter Grimes (Grammy), Billy Budd, and in Giulio Cesare (Paris Opéra), and Romeo Death in Venice. Philip Langridge died in 2010. in I Capuleti e i Montecchi and Sesto in La clemenza di Tito (English National Opera). Roderick Williams is a versatile artist, frequently She appears on Chandos’ recording of Vaughan appearing in opera, concert, and recital Williams’s Sir John in Love under Richard Hickox. throughout Europe and the UK. He has sung the roles of the Count (The Marriage of Figaro) and Born in Kent in 1939, the tenor Philip Langridge Figaro (The Barber of Seville) for Opera North, CBE studied at the Royal Academy of Music, Donner (The Rhinegold) for English National London. He appeared at international Opera, Watchful and First Shepherd (The Pilgrim’s festivals and opera houses across Europe, Progress) for The Royal Opera, Covent Garden, North America, and Japan, performing with Marcello (La bohème) for Scottish Opera, and internationally renowned orchestras under the Prince André (War and Peace) at the Spoleto world’s leading conductors. He was also active Festival, among others. He has participated in in recital and formed a trio with the fortepianist the premieres of David Sawer’s From Morning David Owen Norris and his daughter, the cellist to Midnight, Martin Butler’s A Better Place, Sally Jennifer Langridge. He was made a CBE in the Beamish’s Monster, and Sir Harrison Birtwistle’s Queen’s Birthday Honours List of 1994 and The Ring Dance of the Nazarene. received a number of other awards, including He performs a diverse range of concert the prestigious Olivier Award, the Singer of repertoire and has appeared with the Nash the Year Award from the Royal Philharmonic Ensemble as well as with The Gabrieli Consort Society, the Santay Award from the Worshipful and Players under Paul McCreesh. His Company of Musicians, and, most recently, discography includes, for Chandos, the highly the NFMS / Charles Groves Prize in 2001 ‘for acclaimed premiere recordings of Vaughan his outstanding contribution to British Music’. Williams’s Nocturne and The Poisoned Kiss, both He sang Aron in the Grammy award-winning conducted by Richard Hickox. recording of Moses und Aron under Sir Georg Solti. Philip Langridge appeared on Chandos’ Born into a musical family, Alban Gerhardt recordings of Handel’s Messiah, Janáček’s studied in his native city, Berlin, at the

41 Cincinnati Conservatory, and under Boris he held the position of Associate and Pergamenschikov and Frans Helmerson at Principal Guest Conductor with the London the Musikhochschule in Cologne. Since his Mozart Players for more than twenty years, debut as soloist with the Berlin Philharmonic during which time he toured with them Orchestra in 1991 he has appeared in concert extensively, and that of Principal Conductor across Europe, working with orchestras such of Sweden’s Uppsala Chamber Orchestra; as the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester, Frankfurt he works regularly with both symphony Radio Symphony Orchestra, Philharmonisches and chamber orchestras in the dual role of Staatsorchester Hamburg, Orchestre national conductor and soloist. de Belgique, Orchestre philharmonique de Since the age of ten he has made many Nice, Mozarteum Orchester Salzburg, appearances on television. A documentary St Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, on Ravel, made in 1998 by the Australian Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and, in the Broadcasting Commission, which featured UK, the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Howard Shelley as conductor, pianist and BBC Philharmonic, BBC Scottish Symphony presenter, won the Gold Medal for the best arts Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony biography of the year at the New York Festivals Orchestra, and Royal Scottish National Awards, and he was the soloist in the 100th Orchestra. During a tour of Japan he gave Anniversary of the Proms Concert which was a recital in Tokyo’s Suntory Hall as well televised worldwide. as performances with the Japan Shinsei He is especially associated with the music of Symphony Orchestra and Nagoya University Rachmaninoff and has performed and recorded Symphony Orchestra. He has appeared at complete cycles of his concertos and works for major international music festivals including, in solo piano. His recordings of piano concertos the UK, the Bath, Aldeburgh, Cheltenham, and by Mozart and Hummel have won exceptional Edinburgh festivals and the BBC Proms. praise, and more than eighty recordings testify to his wide-ranging repertoire. Howard Shelley has enjoyed a distinguished career since his acclaimed London debut in Founded in 1983, the BBC National Chorus 1971. As pianist he has performed, broadcast, of Wales is widely recognised as one of the and recorded around the world with leading leading mixed choirs in the United Kingdom. orchestras and conductors. As a conductor, Directed by Adrian Partington, the Chorus

42 consists of 120 voluntary singers from all Resound | Atsain, the Orchestra’s dynamic walks of life, who possess a love of music and Education and Community Department, extends enthusiasm for singing. The Chorus maintains the work of the Orchestra beyond the confines a close relationship with the BBC National of the concert hall into schools, workplaces, Orchestra of Wales with which it has performed and communities. The BBC National Orchestra works such as Britten’s Spring Symphony at the of Wales has produced a diverse discography BBC Proms with Richard Hickox, and Brahms’s and for Chandos was engaged in the projects to Alto Rhapsody and Martinů’s Field Mass (Polní record the complete works for orchestra by Frank mše) at St David’s Hall, Cardiff. The Chorus Bridge and by Sir Lennox and Michael Berkeley. has also performed Britten’s War Requiem with Leonard Slatkin and the BBC Symphony At the time of his untimely death at the age of Orchestra and Chorus, Tippett’s A Child of sixty in November 2008, Richard Hickox CBE, Our Time, Holst’s Hymn of Jesus, Elgar’s one of the most gifted and versatile British The Music Makers, and a concert for conductors of his generation, was Music Director ‘Choirworks’ on BBC Radio 3. The Chorus’s of Opera Australia, having served as Principal recording of Mendelssohn’s St Paul on Chandos Conductor of the BBC National Orchestra of has been highly acclaimed. Wales from 2000 until 2006 when he became Conductor Emeritus. He founded the City of The BBC National Orchestra of Wales occupies London Sinfonia, of which he was Music Director, an important position as both a national and in 1971. He was also Associate Guest Conductor broadcasting orchestra and went from strength of the London Symphony Orchestra, Conductor to strength over recent years under a conducting Emeritus of the Northern Sinfonia, and co-founder team that included Richard Hickox as Principal of Collegium Musicum 90. Conductor. Its repertoire is extensive and the He regularly conducted the major orchestras Orchestra’s commitment to the performance in the UK and appeared many times at the of contemporary music is highlighted by the BBC Proms and at the Aldeburgh, Bath, and appointment of Michael Berkeley as Composer Cheltenham festivals, among others. With the in Association. With St David’s Hall, Cardiff as London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican its performing home, it also presents a concert Centre he conducted a number of semi-staged series at the Brangwyn Hall, Swansea, and operas, including Billy Budd, Hänsel und Gretel, tours throughout Wales and internationally. and Salome. With the Bournemouth Symphony

43 Orchestra he gave the first ever complete His phenomenal success in the recording cycle of Vaughan Williams’s symphonies studio resulted in more than 280 recordings, in London. In the course of an ongoing including most recently cycles of orchestral relationship with the Philharmonia Orchestra works by Sir Lennox and Michael Berkeley and he conducted Elgar, Walton, and Britten Frank Bridge with the BBC National Orchestra festivals at the South Bank and a semi-staged of Wales, the symphonies of Vaughan Williams performance of Gloriana at the Aldeburgh with the London Symphony Orchestra, and Festival. a series of operas by Britten with the City of Apart from his activities at the Sydney London Sinfonia. He received a Grammy (for Opera House, he enjoyed recent engagements Peter Grimes) and five Gramophone Awards. with The Royal Opera, Covent Garden, English Richard Hickox was awarded a CBE in the National Opera, Vienna State Opera, and Queen’s Jubilee Honours List in 2002, and was Washington Opera, among others. He guest the recipient of many other awards, including conducted such world-renowned orchestras two Music Awards of the Royal Philharmonic as the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Society, the first ever Sir Charles Groves Award, Orchestre de Paris, Bavarian Radio Symphony the Evening Standard Opera Award, and the Orchestra, and New York Philharmonic. Award of the Association of British Orchestras.

44 Sarah Connolly

Peter Warren Philip Langridge

Rihard Davies Roderick Williams Roderick

Keith Saunders COMPACT DISC FOUR In this very peace which is in Thee, the one supreme Eternal Good, 5 A Prayer I will sleep and take my rest. Grant me Thy grace, most merciful Jesus, Thomas à Kempis (1379 / 80 – 1471), that it may be with me, from The Imitation of Christ, and may labour with me, Book 3, Chapter 15 and continue with me to the end.

Grant me always to will and desire that which is most acceptable to Thee, COMPACT DISC FIVE and which pleaseth Thee best. Let Thy will be mine, 5 The Hag and let my will always follow Thine, The hag is astride and agree perfectly therewith. This night for to ride, The devil and she together; Grant me Thy grace etc. Through thick and through thin, Now out and then in, Grant that I may die to all things Though ne’er so foul be the weather. that are in the world, and for Thy sake love to be despised A thorn or a burr and not to be known in this world. She takes for a spur, With a lash of a bramble she rides now; Grant me Thy grace etc. Through brakes and through briars, O’er ditches and mires, Grant that I may rest in Thee She follows the spirit that guides now. above all things that can be desired, and that my heart may be at peace in Thee. No beast for his food Thou art the true peace of the heart, Dares now range the wood, Thou art its only rest; But hush’d in his lair he lies lurking; out of Thee all things are irksome and restless. While mischiefs, by these, On land and on seas, At noon of night are a-working.

48 The storm will arise 7 2. Thou Didst Delight My Eyes And trouble the skies; Thou didst delight my eyes: This night, and more for the wonder, Yet who am I? nor first The ghosts from the tomb Nor last nor best, that durst Affrighted will come, Once dream of thee for prize; Call’d out by the clap of the thunder. Nor this the only time Robert Herrick (1591 – 1674) Thou shalt set love to rhyme.

Thou didst delight my ear: Ah! little praise; thy voice Two Songs of Robert Bridges Makes other hearts rejoice, 6 1. I Praise the Tender Flower Makes all ears glad that hear; I praise the tender flower, And short my joy: but yet, That on a mournful day O song, do not forget. Bloomed in my garden bower And made the winter gay. For what wert thou to me? Its loveliness contented How shall I say? The moon, My heart tormented. That pour’d her midnight noon Upon his wrecking sea; – I praise the gentle maid A sail, that for a day Whose happy voice and smile Has cheer’d the castaway. To confidence betrayed My doleful heart awhile: Robert Seymour Bridges (1844 – 1930) And gave my spirit deploring Fresh wings for soaring. COMPACT DISC SIX The maid for very fear Of love I durst not tell: 1 Blow out, you bugles The rose could never hear, Blow out, you bugles, over the rich Dead! Though I bespake her well: There’s none of these so lonely and poor of old, So in my song I bind them But, dying, has made us rarer gifts than gold. For all to find them. These laid the world away; poured out the red Sweet wine of youth; gave up the years to be

49 Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene, 3 Where she lies asleep That men call age; and those who would have She sleeps so lightly, that in trembling fear been, Beside her, where she lies asleep, I kneel, Their sons, they gave, their immortality. The rush of thought and supplication staying, Lest by some inward sense she see and hear, Blow, bugles, blow! They brought us, for our If I too clearly think, too loudly feel, dearth, And break her rest by praying. Holiness, lacked so long, and Love, and Pain. Mary Elizabeth Coleridge (1861 – 1907) Honour has come back, as a king, to earth, And paid his subjects with a royal wage; And Nobleness walks in our ways again; And we have come into our heritage. 4 Love went a-riding Love went a-riding, Rupert Brooke (1887 – 1915) Love went a-riding over the earth, On Pegasus he rode…

2 Adoration The flowers before him sprang to birth, Asleep! O sleep a little while, white pearl! And the frozen rivers flowed. And let me kneel, and let me pray to thee, Then all the youths and the maidens cried, And let me call Heav’n’s blessing on thine eyes, ‘Stay here with us’, ‘King of Kings’. And let me breathe into the happy air But Love said, ‘No! for the horse I ride, That doth enfold and touch thee all about, For the horse I ride has wings’. Vows of my slavery, my giving up, Mary Elizabeth Coleridge My sudden adoration, my great love!

John Keats (1795 – 1821)

5 Thy hand in mine Thy hand in mine, thy hand in mine, And through the world we two will go, With love before us as a sign, Our faces set to ev’ry foe.

50 My heart in thine, my heart in thine, 7 Mantle of blue Through life, through happy death the same, O men from the fields! We two will kneel before the shrine, Come gently within. And keep alight the sacred flame. Tread softly, softly, O men, coming in. Mary Elizabeth Coleridge

Mavourneen is going From me and from you, 6 Berceuse Where Mary will fold him [The Cottager to Her Infant] With mantle of blue! The days are cold, the nights are long, The north-wind sings a doleful song; From reek of the smoke Then hush again upon my breast; And cold of the floor All merry things are now at rest, And the peering of things Save thee, my pretty Love! Across the half-door.

The kitten sleeps upon the hearth, O men from the fields! The crickets long have ceased their mirth; Soft’, softly come thro’; There’s nothing stirring in the house Mary puts round him Save one wee, hungry, nibbling mouse, Her mantle of blue. Then why so busy thou? Padraic Colum (1881 – 1972)

Nay! start not at that sparkling light; ’Tis but the moon that shines so bright On the window pane bedropped with rain: Then, little Darling! sleep again, 8 Day after day And wake when it is day. Day after day he comes and goes away. Go, and give him a flower from my hair, my Dorothy Wordsworth (1771 – 1855) friend. If he asks who was it that sent it, I entreat you do not tell him my name For he only comes and goes away.

51 He sits on the dust under the tree. Spread there a seat with flowers and leaves, my friend. His eyes are sad, and they bring sadness to my heart. He does not speak what he has in mind; He only comes and goes away.

Rabindranath Tagore (1861 – 1941)

9 Speak to me, my love! Speak to me, my love! Tell me in words what you sang. The night is dark. The stars are lost in clouds. The wind is sighing through the leaves. I will let loose my hair. My blue cloak will cling round me like night. I will clasp your head to my bosom; And there in the sweet loneliness murmur on your heart. I will shut my eyes and listen. I will not look in your face. When your words are ended, we will sit still and silent. Only the trees will whisper in the dark. The night will pale. The day will dawn. We shall look at each other’s eyes and go on our different paths. Speak to me, my love! Tell me in words what you sang.

Rabindranath Tagore

52 Alban Gerhardt Gerhardt Alban

Frank Hülsbömer The premature death of Richard Hickox on 23 November 2008, at the age of just sixty, deprived the musical world of one of its greatest conductors. The depth and breadth of his musical achievements were astonishing, not least in his remarkable work on behalf of British composers. An inspiring figure, and a guiding light to his friends and colleagues, he had a generosity of spirit and a wonderful quality of empathy for others. For someone of his musical achievements, he was never arrogant, never pompous. Indeed there was a degree of humility about Richard that was as endearing as it was unexpected. He was light-hearted and, above all, incredibly enthusiastic about those causes which he held dear. His determination to make things happen for these passions was astonishing – without this energy and focus his achievements could not have been as great as they were. He was able to take others with him on his crusades, and all in the pursuit of great music. Richard was a completely rounded musician with a patience, kindness, and charisma that endeared him to players and singers alike. His enthusiasm bred its own energy and this, in turn, inspired performers. He was superb at marshalling

54 large forces. He cared about the development of the artists with whom he worked and they repaid this loyalty by giving of their best for him. An unassuming man who was always a delight to meet, Richard was a tireless musical explorer who was able to create a wonderful sense of spirituality, which lifted performances to become special, memorable events. For these reasons, Richard was loved as well as respected. The Richard Hickox Legacy is a celebration of the enormously fruitful, long-standing collaboration between Richard Hickox and Chandos, which reached more than 280 recordings. This large discography will remain a testament to his musical energy and exceptional gifts for years to come. The series of re-issues now underway captures all aspects of his art. It demonstrates his commitment to an extraordinarily wide range of music, both vocal and orchestral, from the past three centuries. Through these recordings we can continue to marvel at the consistently high level of his interpretations whilst wondering what more he might have achieved had he lived longer.

55 Also available

Holst The Wandering Scholar • Suite de ballet • A Song of the Night CHAN 10725 X

56 Also available

Elgar The Light of Life CHAN 10726 X

57 Also available

Howells Hymnus Paradisi • A Kent Yeoman’s Wooing Song CHAN 10727 X

58 Also available

Vaughan Williams A Cotswold Romance • The Death of Tintagiles CHAN 10728 X

59 Also available

Dyson The Canterbury Pilgrims At the Tabard Inn • In Honour of the City CHAN 241-43

60 You can now purchase Chandos CDs or download MP3s online at our website: www.chandos.net

For requests to license tracks from this CD or any other Chandos discs please find application forms on the Chandos website or contact the Finance Director, Chandos Records Ltd, direct at the address below or via e-mail at [email protected].

Chandos Records Ltd, Chandos House, 1 Commerce Park, Commerce Way, Colchester, Essex CO2 8HX, UK. E-mail: [email protected] Telephone: + 44 (0)1206 225 200 Fax: + 44 (0)1206 225 201

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Produced in association with and and

The BBC word mark and logo are trade marks of the British Broadcasting Corporation and used under licence. BBC Logo © 2011

Recorded with financial support from the Royal College of Music Frank Bridge Bequest

61 Series consultant Paul Hindmarsh

Recording producer Brian Couzens Sound engineer Ralph Couzens Assistant engineers Christopher Brooke (Vols 1, 2, and 3 [Sir Roger de Coverley]), Matthew Walker (Vols 3 [other works] and 4), Michael Common (Vols 5 and 6) Editor Rachel Smith Mastering Peter Newble Recording venue Brangwyn Hall, Swansea; 26 and 27 November 2000 (Vol. 1, Vol. 3 [Sir Roger de Coverley]), 19 and 20 September 2001 (Vol. 2), 28 and 29 November 2002 (Vol. 3 [other works]), 13 and 14 May 2003 (Vol. 4), 3 and 4 December 2003 (Vol. 5), & 23 and 24 October 2004 (Vol. 6) Front cover Montage by designer incorporating the original CD covers which included a photograph of Hampstead Heath in the 1930s © Hulton Archive Back cover Photograph of Richard Hickox by Greg Barrett Design and typesetting Cassidy Rayne Creative (www.cassidyrayne.co.uk) Booklet editor Finn S. Gundersen Publishers Faber Music Ltd (Enter Spring, Isabella, Mid of the Night, Dance Rhapsody, Five Entr’actes, Dance Poem, Allegro moderato), Augener Ltd / Stainer & Bell Ltd (Two Poems for Orchestra), Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd (Norse Legend, Vignettes de danse, Rebus, Oration, Two Intermezzi from Threads, Two Old English Songs, Two Entr’actes, Blow out, you bugles, Adoration, Where she lies asleep, Love went a-riding, Thy hand in mine, Mantle of blue), Stainer & Bell Ltd (The Sea, Summer, Phantasm, There Is a Willow Grows aslant a Brook, Sir Roger de Coverley, A Prayer, Day after day, Speak to me, my love!), Copyright Control (Coronation March, Two Songs of Robert Bridges), Goodwin & Tabb Ltd (Lament), Chester Music Ltd (Suite), Frank Bridge Trust (The Hag, Valse Intermezzo à cordes, The Pageant of London), Thames Publishing / William Elkin Music Services (Todessehnsucht), Royal College of Music (Berceuse ‘The days are cold’, Chant d’espérance, A Royal Night of Variety), Keith Prowse & Co., Ltd (Berceuse), Chappell & Co. (Serenade) p 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2005 Chandos Records Ltd This compilation p 2012 Chandos Records Ltd Digital remastering p 2012 Chandos Records Ltd c 2012 Chandos Records Ltd Chandos Records Ltd, Colchester, Essex CO2 8HX, England Country of origin UK

62 Howard Shelley Howard

Robbie Jack B NOW / Hickox NCW / BBC Soloists / BBC – WORKS ORCHESTRAL BRIDGE: NOW / Hickox NCW / BBC Soloists / BBC – WORKS ORCHESTRAL BRIDGE: CHANDOS DIGITAL CHAN 10729(6) X

Frank Bridge (1879 – 1941)

COMPACT DISC ONE TT 75:47 Enter Spring | Isabella | Two Poems for Orchestra Mid of the Night

COMPACT DISC TWO TT 72:34 Dance Rhapsody | Five Entr’actes | Dance Poem Produced in association with Norse Legend | The Sea

COMPACT DISC THREE TT 69:51 coronation March | Summer | Phantasm there Is a Willow Grows aslant a Brook | Vignettes de danse sir Roger de Coverley (for large orchestra)

The BBC word mark and logo are trade marks COMPACT DISC FOUR TT 77:01 of the British Broadcasting Corporation and Rebus | Oration (Concerto elegiaco) | Allegro moderato used under licence. BBC Logo © 2011 lament | A Prayer Sarah Connolly mezzo-soprano COMPACT DISC FIVE TT 68:17 Philip Langridge tenor suite for Strings | The Hag | Two Songs of Robert Bridges Roderick Williams baritone two Intermezzi from ‘Threads’ | Two Old English Songs two Entr’actes | Valse Intermezzo à cordes | Todessehnsucht Alban Gerhardt cello sir Roger de Coverley (for strings) Howard Shelley piano BBC National Chorus of Wales COMPACT DISC SIX TT 61:14 Adrian Partington chorus master Blow out, you bugles | Adoration | Where she lies asleep BBC National Orchestra of Wales love went a-riding | Thy hand in mine | Berceuse Nicholas Whiting • Janice Graham CHAN 10729(6) X CHAN 10729(6) X Mantle of blue | Day after day | Speak to me, my love! Lucy Gould • James Clark Berceuse (orchestral version) | Chant d’espérance | Serenade Lesley Hatfield leaders the Pageant of London | A Royal Night of Variety Richard Hickox

p 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2005 Chandos Records Ltd Digital remastering p 2012 Chandos Records Ltd c 2012 Chandos Records Ltd p 2012 Chandos Records Ltd c 2012 Chandos Records Ltd Chandos Records Ltd • Colchester • Essex • England Chandos Records Ltd • Colchester • Essex • England